I'll Love You Long After You're Gone
by lovealwayskatie
Summary: It's not like she's pining after boys stuck in Toronto with an affinity for flannel and recycling. She's not. / How Jake & Katie work post-grad.


_A/N. My first time with Jake and Katie, and I hope I did them justice! I miss them dearly. Title is from Phil Phillip's "Gone, Gone, Gone"._

* * *

She cries at graduation.

She swore to herself that she wouldn't, because it's not like high school was that great, but she's singing about how she had the time or her life – which, holy shit, she hopes not – and Marisol is crying and this is it. It's all over. She survived high school, and even though she spent half of it wishing she was anywhere else, now that she actually will be, she's surprisingly sad and completely terrified about the future.

At the end, they throw their hats into the air, and she jumps, trying to catch hers. But Jake grabs her hat first, being almost a full head taller than her and all, and laughs when she stands on her tiptoes to snatch it back. "Come on, Matlin," he teases.

She glares and crosses her arms over her chest. "You suck, Martin."

He smirks but relents, placing the mortarboard back on her head. He fixes the gold tassel, making sure that it is on the left side of her face, and his fingers linger a moment too long.

They aren't back together. Kissing at prom was . . . nice. Really nice. Like, snuggling underneath your favorite blanket on a cold day. But it didn't change that their lives were going in complete opposite directions – soccer camp and mushroom picking, Stanford and his dad's construction business.

"Hey," he says quietly.

She thinks of board games and egging cars and kissing him for the first time.

"Hello."

She considers leaning up, kissing him one last time, like book ends for their story.

But he lets go of the tassel and clears his throat. "C'mere," he says, outstretching his arms for a hug, and she wraps her arms around him. She rests her chin on his shoulder and sighs, because this is really more comfortable than it should be.

They let go, and Jake turns, searching for Mo in the sea of royal blue.

"Katie!" A voice squeals and she looks, just in time to see Marisol vaulting herself into her best friend's arms. "I can't believe it's over," Marisol mumbles, sniffling. Katie wraps her arms around Marisol's neck as tightly as she can.

* * *

She spends the summer as a counselor at a soccer camp. The pay is alright, and she saves almost all of it, because California is expensive. She doesn't exactly love kids, but she does love soccer, making the experience infinitely more bearable. She's only been back to playing for two months, and her stamina is shit compared to what it used to be, but playing six days a week helps.

She realizes that she missed soccer more than she had thought.

Eight weeks flies by as fast as eight weeks can, and before she knows it, she's back in Toronto. She only has two weeks before she leaves for Stanford, and Maya has this list of activities they need to do together before she leaves. But she makes time for Marisol, too, because they're going to be on opposite sides of country until winter break.

Three days before she leaves, Marisol and Mo throw an end of the summer party, and there's a bonfire and s'mores and sparklers, and Jake is there wearing flannel even though it's a hundred degrees outside. It's the first time she's seen him since graduation, and it's the last time she'll see him until . . . She's not sure when exactly.

"How was British Columbia?" she asks when he sits next to her with a bag of marshmallows.

He spears a marshmallow and begins to roast it over the fire. "Good," he says then smiles so wide that he gets crinkles by his eyes. "Me and the shrooms had a blast."

She rolls her eyes but smiles in spite of herself. Some things never change.

"How was soccer camp?"

She turns her stick idly, the marshmallow rotating over the fire. "It was really good. I missed playing."

"That's good to hear." He says it so sincerely that she can't _not_ believe him, and she wishes that she could thank him – without him, she would never have gotten back into soccer. She never would have gotten through this year, period.

"Hey, I wanted – "

"Your marshmallow is on fire," he interrupts.

She blinks, caught off guard, then looks at her stick, the once nicely toasted marshmallow now engulfed in flames. "Crap," she says, hurrying to put out the fire and failing miserably. Jake lets out a laugh then takes the stick, blowing out the fire in one try. The marshmallow is a blackened, charred mess.

He sees her grimace and passes her his perfectly roasted marshmallow.

She mumbles her thanks and puts together her s'more, careful not to get any on her fingers.

"So," she starts again. "You know how Mo said all that stuff at graduation?" He stares at her blankly, so she continues, "About wanting you to be in his life? Even after this year?"

He nods slowly, and his eyebrows are crinkled ever so slightly in confusion.

"Well . . . Mo isn't the only one who'd like to keep in touch," she finally gets out. He doesn't respond right away, just keeps looking at her, and she keeps going, her voice higher, "Because you've been one of my really good friends this year, and I think it would be a shame if we, you know, just stopped talking, because we don't see each other every day."

He bumps his knee against hers, a nice way of telling her to shut up, but he's smiling. "You don't lose my number, and I won't lose yours. Deal?"

A small smile stretches across her lips. "Deal."

* * *

She loves Stanford. It's challenging and intellectual and a fresh start. She isn't immediately labeled as Soccer Playing Katie or Class President Katie or Pissed as Hell Katie. No one knows about her bulimia or rehab stint or anything, really. Not if she doesn't want them to. She's not trying to hide her past, per say. She's simply grateful for the opportunity to no longer be defined by those mistakes, to truly have the chance to put them behind her, and tell people what she wants when she wants. It's refreshing.

Her roommate's name is Becca, and she's cool. She's from Massachusetts and is pre-law, meaning she's kind of intimidating and most definitely opinionated – even more so than Katie herself. But she has good taste in music and the same size shoe as Katie, so who is she to complain?

The first weekend of school, Becca invites Katie to a party, and it's kind of gross and sweaty but not too bad. Most everybody is sloppy drunk, and Katie drinks but knows her limits. She's never been one for dancing, at least not the way that people at college parties do. She prefers to hang out, playing drinking games or talking to people. And lucky for her, she learns early that a good way to get creepy guys to leave her alone is to tell them that she knows taekwondo.

But she doesn't scare off any guy who tries to talk to her. She makes a point not to, because it's not like she's pining after boys stuck in Toronto with an affinity for flannel and recycling.

She's not.

She makes out with a guy with blonde hair and dimples when he smiles wide enough. He's cute in a boy band kind of way, and he kisses alright. He threads his fingers through her hair the right way and doesn't use too much tongue, thank god. It's pretty good, but it's not what she's used to.

* * *

She texts him first.

She's been at school for almost a month, and she's thought about texting him a thousand times. But it always seemed dumb to send something as simple as _'hey'_ or _'what's up?'_ and have nothing of substance to say.

Finally, she sucks it up and sends him a picture of the many cacti on campus and the comment, _'I miss the garden'_. She almost calls it their garden, but it seems wrong since there isn't even a _them_ anymore.

It takes Jake twenty one minutes to text her back, and Katie's pretty certain she loses a year off her life for each and every minute. He tells her that she's got to come back and visit it sometime soon.

Falling back into conversation is easy after that. He's in Toronto, still helping his dad with the construction business as well as working with a company that promotes schools becoming more eco-friendly. He sounds happy and oddly grown up, and she thinks of all the times he complained about people being on his case for not wanting to go to college. Clearly, he had some things better figured out than anyone thought.

"I have my own apartment, too," he says, "Which is weird."

"I never thought I'd hear a teenage boy complain about having his own bachelor pad," she teases.

He scoffs. "Trust me, it's the lamest bachelor pad known to man." Her heart squeezes, but she doesn't press for more information, and he changes the topic. "How are you? Have you gone all Cali on me?"

"Hardly. Toronto still has my heart," she replies. She loves California and its eternal good weather, but she misses her parents, Maya, him – all of which reside in Canada and a large part of her heart. "But I do love it here. You would, too."

She can't imagine anyone hating it here, but she could see Jake especially liking it. Everyone has a laid back attitude, like him, and loves being outdoors, because they can. She could almost picture him visiting, too – her showing him around campus, taking him to her favorite coffee shop, sitting in her dorm room without saying a word, content enough to be in the other person's presence, just like they would back home.

"Who knows," he says, "I might have to take you up on that."

* * *

Halloween is freaking insane, and Katie remembers little to none of it. She has memories of taking shots with Becca and playing slap cup and beer pong, but they are fuzzy and don't help her piece together much of what happened. She at least ended up back her room, though, so she'll count that as a positive.

She's only been awake for a few minutes, debating how badly she really needs to move when her head feels like it might explode, when her phone rings. Jake Martin flashes across the screen. Jake? They've talked a few times, but it's mostly over text, and he's never called her first.

She slips out of her room, mindful of not waking a sleeping Becca, and answers. "Hello?" She winces, her voice amplified by the pounding in her head.

"Hey," he says, and he sounds way to chipper to be Jake Martin. "How's that hangover, Miss Matlin?"

"How did you know – "

"You called me last night," he explains, and she can practically see that stupid grin she'd come to know and hate (and love) on his face.

The color drains from her face. Oh, God. What did she do? "I did?" She doesn't mean for it to, but her voice squeaks.

He laughs. "Yeah. You said that you missed me."

Oh. "That's it?"

"I mean," he continues. "You went on for a long time about how you miss your friends and your family and the garden and fucking me – "

"What?" she blurts out, because oh, god, _no_.

"Yeah, you went into detail on that one. About my dick and my mouth and my fingers," he says, and he sounds so fucking pleased with him. It's good that he thinks this is funny, though, because she wants to die. Her face is burning, and he's talking like he's reading off his grocery list.

"Stop," she interrupts. "For the love of God, stop."

"But Matlin, you said that I was the best sex of your life," he teases. She buries her head in her hands, because he thinks this is funny. Not mortifying or wildly inappropriate but _funny_. "Although, I gotta admit, I would hope so when my competition is Drew Torres – "

"I'm hanging up," she threatens, and she wants nothing more than to slap the stupid grin off his face.

"Come on, Katie," and his voice is softer. "You were drunk. This was bound to happen eventually."

She narrows her eyes, because no, actually, drunk dialing Jake had not been on her college bucket list. "I have to go," she says and hangs up before he says another word.

* * *

Winter break sneaks up on her. Finals are brutal, and she essentially moves into the library and runs solely on caffeine. But she survives and ends her first semester with a 3.75, which makes her want to cry tears of joy. And just like that, she's done. Half of her freshman year is over, and she's ready to be in Toronto, to go home.

On her first day back, it snows, blanketing everything in white, and Maya drags her outside to make snow angels like they used to when they were younger.

Katie lies down and moves her arms back and forth and stares up at the sky. It's gray, the sun nowhere to be found, and snowflakes float down, sticking to her coat and her hair. She catches one on her tongue. It's calm and eerily quiet, but it's nice, she decides.

"Katie?" She turns her head to look at her sister. Her blonde curls are longer, and she's wearing contacts now. "I missed you," Maya says, and her voice sounds so small.

She smiles. "I missed you, too, Chicken Little."

* * *

Marisol tackles her. Like, really tackles her, and they end up sprawled out on Clare's living room floor, laughing so hard it hurts.

Mo surveys them, shaking his head, and mumbles something about how weird girls are.

Clare's hosting a Christmas party, and it's the first time Katie has the opportunity to see everyone since being back. Everyone is home, even people like Eli and herself who went on what felt like the opposite side of the world for school, and with surprising ease, they are able to slip back into friendships like they haven't missed a day.

"Nice shirt," someone says, and Katie turns to see Jake. They've talked a little since the Halloween debacle after she regained a bit of her dignity, and he, fortunately, never brought it up again.

She looks down at her forest green flannel, eyebrows furrowed in confusion. It's too big for her, reaching the top of her thighs, and she's rolled the sleeves up twice.

Oh. Yeah. It was his.

"It always did look better on me anyway," she jokes, and he doesn't disagree.

Instead, he says, "Your hair is different."

Instinctively, she picks up a lock. The last time she saw him, her hair was dark brown, and now, it's even lighter from fading dye and sunlight. California really did get to her in some ways, she guesses. Her bangs have grown out, too. She barely even looks like the girl he dated last year.

"You look good," he adds.

He looks the same, but he's always looked good, so she says, "You, too."

He asks her about the end of the semester, shaking his head in amusement when she tells him about living in the library but congratulating her on finishing her first semester. "I'm glad that you're happy," he says, and he smiles.

She smiles back and feels warm inside, spreading to the tips of her fingers and toes.

"Mistletoe!" Someone exclaims in a sing-song voice, and she turns to see Imogen skipping around in an entirely red and green ensemble, waving the evergreen plant above people's heads. She skids to a stop in front of Katie and Jake and stands on her tiptoes so that the plant is dangling above them.

Neither moves.

Imogen stares expectantly for what feels like an eternity, and Katie looks at the floor. Great. Getting rejected by Jake because of a stupid plant is exactly how she wants to spend this evening. "You guys have to kiss," she commands. "It's the rules."

Katie's eyes meet Jake's then, and he shrugs before leaning down to peck her on the lips as fast as he can, so fast she doesn't have time to register what's happening, let alone respond. "There you go," he tells Imogen.

"Yay!" Imogen exclaims, clapping gleefully and skipping off to bother others.

Katie's eyes fall back to the ground, and she finds herself suddenly fascinated with a scuff on the toe of her boot.

"Do you want to go get coffee?" he asks suddenly.

* * *

The snow crunches underfoot, and she cradles her coffee cup in her mitten-clad hands.

"Is it weird being here alone?" she asks as they pass her old taekwondo studio. It's not too late yet, so they decided to walk around the quiet streets.

He shrugs. "I still see my family a lot. Mo isn't that far either." She forgot that he went to the University of Toronto, only a twenty minute drive from here. "I like living alone, too."

She thinks of her dorm room, of Becca, and she likes the company and the knowledge that someone else is there. Like how she always knew Maya was just on the other side of a wall if she ever needed her. Besides, in the past months, her roommate has figured her out pretty well and knows when she wants to talk and when she doesn't. She's lucky as far as roommates go.

"It's weird that you're not here," he admits quietly, and he sounds nervous to say it. Jake is never nervous.

She looks over at him for the first time, and he's staring at her so intently that she can't not confess, "It's weird for me, too."

He doesn't say anything, only keeps staring. She inhales. Exhales. And keeps talking.

"I was so used to being able to see my friends every day, and having those friendships were so easy. I didn't even realize how lucky I was, though, because I spent so much of my time wanting to get out of here, but then when I was actually leaving, the only place I wanted to be was here, you know? Because I had all these things that I still wanted to do or so that I wouldn't be able to."

She doesn't understand why she's still talking, except that it's her attempt to fill what otherwise would be awkward silence. And now that she's started, she can't see to be able to stop, like a dam that has burst. "Like . . . with you," she says. "The timing, God, it just fucking sucked for us, and I broke it, and I didn't have the time to fix it, not really, because I was leaving. And maybe it's just me that feels like this, but it's weird between us now, and I don't want it to be, but it is, and there's nothing – "

He kisses her.

His nose is cold, and her lips are chapped, but he smells like coffee and snow and _Jake_. His hands cradle the side of her face, his thumbs resting on her cheekbones, and she pushes herself up on her toes to kiss him harder.

She can't hear anything over the racing of her heart.

Nothing has changed. The logical part of Katie Matlin is screaming, because this didn't work out the first time, and now? He's an even bigger liability. They're even farther apart, traveling in even more opposite directions, and time and place and fate will never be on their side. But another part of Katie Matlin, a much, much smaller part, tells her to shut up, to stop thinking, because she misses him and needs him and loves him, hopelessly and irreversibly.

She keeps kissing him.

And it's like falling down the rabbit hole all over again.

* * *

He breaks the kiss, and his nose bumps against hers. His eyes are still half closed when he asks, "Do you want to go to my apartment?"

She looks up at him through her eyelashes and nods wordlessly.

* * *

His hands shake when he tries to unlock the door, and it takes him three tries. She giggles, burying her head in his shoulder. "A little eager there, Martin?" she teases.

He manages to unlock the door and pushes it open, shoving hard when it sticks. She closes the door behind them and when she turns around, finds herself sandwiched between the door and Jake. He moves closer, and her back is flat against the door.

"Hey," he says, low. He reaches up and tucks a piece of hair behind her ear, his hand resting on her neck.

"Hi," she breathes.

This is potentially a bad idea. Actually, it's highly likely that it is. She's not a prude, but sex means something to her, and they haven't talked about anything. Does he like her? Is that why he kissed her? What is even happening?

Then he gives her a crooked smile, and fuck. She's screwed.

He leans down, lips hovering over hers, and his breath fans out across her mouth. He doesn't close the gap, though, and this is cruel, this is torture.

Katie lets out a groan and pulls him down to kiss him hard. He smirks against her mouth, and she can practically hear him – _Now who's the eager one?_ he would say. She bites down gently on his bottom lip, taking it into her mouth and effectively wiping the smirk off his face.

They're out of practice. They attempt to get to Jake's room without breaking their kiss, resulting in stepping on each other's toes and slamming their foreheads together, until finally, he lets out an exasperated sigh and hoists a giggling Katie over his shoulder. Taking off clothes turns into a tangle of limbs when she gets his shirt caught over his head and he can't peel her skinny jeans off. She ends up having to stop, get off the bed, and shimmy out of her jeans.

When she finally gets out of her pants, she crawls back on top of Jake who's trying not to laugh. "We suck at this," she complains.

His eyes narrow, and with newfound determination, he flips her over and kisses her deeply, pressing her into the mattress.

He moves to kiss a line down her stomach, his hands gripping her hips to keep her from moving. He presses kisses along the inside of her thighs, and she whimpers, saying through clenched teeth, "Fuck, Jake. Get on with it."

He smirks, and she wants to kick him in the face. Smug asshole. But then he slips a finger inside her, and she loses track of her own name, not to mention what she thinks of Jake Martin in that exact moment. A combination of his fingers and tongue make her feel like she's on fire, and she's certain that she's going to die or explode or –

"Jake," she whines, arching her back off the mattress. He doesn't listen, adding another finger instead. She hasn't gone this far in so long, and the fact that she is now with Jake is too, too much.

She grabs a fistful of his hair and yanks his head up. "Condom, now," she commands. He grins, and for a moment, she thinks he's going to make one of his snarky remarks. But he doesn't. He starts rummaging through his bedside table.

When he pushes in, finally, she chokes on her own breath. It hurts a little, after so long, and he pauses. "You okay?"

She nods and shifts, trying to adjust to the feel of him. When she begins to rake her fingernails down his back, he takes that as a sign to move, pulling out and pushing back in slowly. She hums delightedly, each thrust sending sparks through her body.

It doesn't take very long, for either of them, and she likes the sound of her name on his lips when he finishes.

When he pulls out, falling onto the mattress next to her, she feels empty and already misses the warmth of his body so close. She turns on her side to face him, instinctually curling into him for the heat. He smiles at her and finds her hand, holding it in his own.

* * *

"Jake," she murmurs. She's sitting up, wearing her shirt – his shirt – again to stay warm, and his eyes are closed. He's asleep, his chest rising and falling slowly. "Jake," she repeats and shakes him gently. He stirs and squints up at her sleepily.

"What are we doing?" She asks, and he's rubs his eyes and pushes himself up onto his pillow. His hair is sticking up in the back, and her fingers itch to smooth it down for him. He quirks an eyebrow in confusion, and she repeats, "What are . . . we?"

She gestures between the two of them, and he grabs her hand and entwines their fingers. "What do you want to be?" he asks.

"I . . ." She stares at their fingers, aligning easily like puzzle pieces. "I want to be with you." It's the first time in forever that she's allowed herself to even think that, and the words stick in her throat.

"But it's not that easy," she says, and she's not sure if she's talking to him or herself when she continues, "Everything got so fucked up last time, and we're different from who we were then, yeah, but some things haven't changed at all. Like, you'll be here, and I won't, and it's like what I said before – our timing is awful, and I don't think it's any better this time around, and – " She holds up her hands in front of herself, in an attempt to form a personal Jake Martin shield. "And don't kiss me just so that I'll stop talking, because you're really good at it, but it doesn't actually fix anything."

He leans forward and grabs her chin so suddenly that she chokes on her words. "Katie," he says, and his eyes are bright. "You have to hear me when I say this. I want to do this. Last time, you and I, we gave up. Things got messy, and we bailed. That's the difference this time. I want to make it work, and I hope, I think you do, too." Her chin trembles in his hand, and she wills herself not to cry. "Long distance, fights, crazy mood swings" – she glares at him, and he smiles a mega-watt smile – "I don't care. You're it."

Her mouth twitches, wanting to smile, but she bites it back. She wants to try, too, so badly.

"You and me," she says, testing the words out for herself. "For real this time?"

He closes the gap and kisses her softly, his hands coming up to cradle her face. He pulls back, and her eyes flutter open. "I'm all yours if you want me."

* * *

Jake flies to California for her spring break, and she picks him at the airport. The moment she sees him, she takes off running, and he wraps his arms around her, lifting her with ease. It's completely cheesy, and she knows people are staring, but she doesn't care. It's been three months since she last saw him, and that's approximately three months too long.

She peppers kisses on his cheeks, his neck, and after he sets her down, she kisses him hard on the mouth.

He laughs when she finally lets go. "A little eager there, Matlin?" he asks, draping his arm over her shoulders.

She swats at him, and he ducks out of the way.

* * *

_Thank you for reading! Reviews are greatly appreciated._


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